When 'Love Is Love' Isn't Enough

In the wake of the terrible tragedy in Orlando, many have understandably turned to love. Love is warming. Love is beautiful. Love is an imperfect, but no less joyous feeling. So, it is not at all surprising to see multiple well-meaning, sympathetic people invoke "love wins" and "love is love" in response to the hatred that was conveyed in its most vitriolic and violent form at the Pulse nightclub.

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I love an early '90s ballad from Mariah Carey and Céline Dion too, but love does not always win. Love is not always enough. Although love is beautiful, it has severe limitations.

The invocation of love made sense in the context of marriage equality, as a political strategy. This benefited the gay rights movement because love is a universal and lofty emotion that's easily consumed.

Nonetheless, that was a specific use for a specific argument—one that is increasingly proving impractical with respect to advocating tolerance and our basic civil rights in areas outside of marriage.

I love an early '90s ballad from Mariah Carey and Celine Dion, too, but love does not always win.

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When it comes to gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and gender-queer people, we need to talk about these identities outside of the prisms of love and romantic partnerships. We need to be able to consider same-sex identities outside of just romance. Sometimes it's not about love; sometimes people just want to f**k. Straight people should understand this. We are no different than you all in that regard.

Sometimes, when you see two men kissing, it is just passion, and yes, that denotes sex. Sex is perfectly natural. Sex and passion conveyed by two consenting adults is perfectly fine.

How two men express affection for each other—again, sex—is not widely seen in mass media. The sight still makes many—even those who claim to accept marriage equality—uncomfortable. We have learned that the sight of two men kissing each other angered the shooter in Orlando, Omar Mateen. Were those two men in love? None of us know. But more importantly, it shouldn't matter: non-heterosexual relationships should not continue to be solely spoken of in the context of love.

To continue speaking about the LGBT community only within the realm of romance is to prevent people from confronting blunt realities about human sexuality.

Men like Omar Mateen and Elliot Morales never get to the point of "love wins" because the world still largely tells them that their basic human urges are unnatural. Let me be clear: I have no sympathy for these men; no level of internal struggle justifies their horrific actions. But to continue speaking about the LGBT community only within the realm of romance is to prevent people from confronting blunt realities about human sexuality. I, too, once turned to religion to suppress my sexuality, but thank God I found the strength to stop fighting off urges I've had since I was six-years-old.

Heterosexuality is not solely defined by romanticism and Disney-film like depictions. Neither should homosexuality or bisexuality be so defined. There are many things we all need to do. If you are Christian or Islamic, you can do the work to make safer spaces for queer religious people. If you truly want members of the LGBT to find acceptance, you need to acknowledge every facet of them—including their sexuality. To anyone reading this that has any doubts about their same sex attractions, I say to you: You are who you were made to be. Let no one convince you otherwise.

We all need to do our part to let gay and bisexual people know that their urges are what makes them human. Love can't win if a person never learns to love all parts of themselves first.